Video: Title eliminator or not, Johny Hendricks will make his case at UFC 154

For essentially the past half year, Johny Hendricks was told his next bout would be a title eliminator.

And UFC officials announced it as such when he was paired with fellow contender Martin Kampmann in the pay-per-view co-headliner at Saturday’s UFC 154 event.

Although UFC President Dana White recently said he now has “no idea” if the winner will, in fact, get a title shot, Hendricks said he’ll make his case this weekend.

“You can’t really control that,” Hendricks told MMAjunkie.com Radio (www.mmajunkie.com/radio) regarding White’s about-face. “The only thing I can do is go out there and win. It doesn’t matter how or with what. Just get the W, and then we can start working for something else. The way I look at it, to sit there and worry about all that stuff, you start putting more pressure on yourself.

“It’s out of my control. The only thing I can control is how I fight that night. … Then I can start making my case for other stuff.”

Hendricks (13-1 MMA, 8-1 UFC), who fights Kampmann (20-5 MMA, 11-4 UFC) at Montreal’s Bell Centre, may be the victim of the UFC’s grandiose plans for UFC 154’s main event. If UFC welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre successfully returns from an injury and defeats interim champ Carlos Condit, GSP may be slotted for a stadium-show superfight against middleweight champ Anderson Silva, who will be cageside at UFC 154.

That means the Hendricks-Kampmann winner could be the odd man out.

Hendricks, though, isn’t concerned. In case St-Pierre or Condit dropped off the card, he treated this latest camp as though it was for a title shot. He was doing “seven or eight rounds per night” of training, and he’s going to keep that gameplan as long as he keeps winning.

Currently, he’s riding a four-fight win streak. Most recently, he’s defeated a murderers’ row of the 170-pound division with victories over Mike Pierce and former title challengers Jon Fitch and Josh Koscheck.

“[Those wins] were huge,” Hendricks said. “I think Pierce is one of the most underrated fighters there is. People don’t give Pierce that much credit. I think he’s a tough, tough, tough dude. And Jon Fitch, you’re going to go against another very tough competitor, and then after that you’re going to fight Josh Kocheck. Having that kind of mental preparation for each fight, that’s huge because now I know those are the types of guys I’m going to be facing if I win the belt. Now I know I can keep that intensity every fight … and I can stay healthy while doing it.”

Hendricks, who called upon weight-cutting/dieting consultant Mike Dolce to keep his weight in check for this camp, also amped up his cardio with steady work at Oklahoma State University with its wrestling team, where Hendricks was a two-time NCAA Division I national champion before his move to MMA.

It was all to help prepare for Kampmann, a former training partner Hendricks knows well. Hendricks takes a lot of credit for helping Kampmann the kickboxer become Kampmann the well-rounded mixed martial artist.

Hendricks believes he learned a lot about his opponent from the Las Vegas training sessions, but he’s not sure Kampmann can say the same.

“I taught him how to wrestle,” Hendricks said. “I was teaching him to wrestle, and we trained a lot. But none of that matters because Kampmann was already good at that point. The Kampmann we see today is the same Kampmann we saw at 185 (pounds). Where here, when he trained with me, I was a nobody. All I had at that point was wrestling. My standup wasn’t that good, I wasn’t that confident in anything, but I knew I could take him down.

“The fighter he’s going to face now is probably a hundred times better than the one three-and-a-half years ago. I can’t wait to show him how I’ve progressed.”

So what did Hendricks learn? That he’s got his work cut out for him come Saturday. Kampmann is 5-2 over his past seven fights, but it arguably should be 7-0.

And Kampmann has survived some grueling, bloody and violent affairs during the stretch.

“He was tough,” Hendricks said. “He was a tough guy. Everything comes crisp but not a lot of power. He’s got a good fighting stance, he’s going to stay in the pocket, and he’s going to hit you. That’s what you’re dealing with with Kampmann. And he can take a punch.

“I know to hurt him, I’ve got to really, really hurt him. And if I do hurt him, don’t get in there wildly. Go in there controlled and see the openings. Don’t rush it. Find the openings and throw your hands.”

MMAjunkie.com Radio broadcasts Monday-Friday at noon ET (9 a.m. PT) live from Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino’s Race & Sports Book. The show is hosted by “Gorgeous” George Garcia, MMAjunkie.com lead staff reporter John Morgan and producer Brian “Goze” Garcia. For more information or to download past episodes, go to www.mmajunkie.com/radio.

From Our Partners

The Latest

As the UFC 189 tour made its last stop in Dublin, featherweight champ Jose Aldo was met with a torrent of abuse from the Irish fans. It might have been unpleasant, but it might also have been just what he needed.